5 things to know about Marlins All-Star Giancarlo Stanton

MINNEAPOLIS — With the 2014 MLB All-Star Game on tap Tuesday at Target Field, For the Win is presenting very important facts about select All-Stars. Here are five things to know about Marlins outfielder Giancarlo Stanton:

1. He hits massive home runs

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Though Stanton fell to Todd Frazier in the semifinals at Monday night’s Home Run Derby, he provided arguably the event’s best highlight — a 510-foot blast that nearly left Target Field altogether. No one in the Majors hits the ball harder than Stanton, who’s averaging a league-leading 423.8 feet on his home runs this season.

“Those are the ones that you don’t even feel; it just feels like a feather hits your bat and it just takes off, and you see it go off into the distance,” said Stanton of his massive moonshots. “Everything just goes quiet for a split second, and you know you’re going to get four bags after that.”

2. He’s in this amazing photo

It’s funny because it’s a very large man on a very small horse.

“I didn’t really ride that thing — it couldn’t hold me for more than a photo,” said Stanton, who spoke on behalf of T-Mobile at All-Star FanFest. “I thought it would be a funny photo, and it turned out to be.”

3. He played against Richard Sherman

(Mark J. Rebilas/USA TODAY Sports)

Before he committed to playing baseball full-time, Stanton drew Division I scholarship offers as a standout wide receiver with a 4.5-second time in the 40-yard dash at Notre Dame HS in California.

“I was All-CIF (California Interscholastic Federation) for multiple years,” he said. “We never won a championship, but we got close. We lost in the championship to Compton-Dominguez. Richard Sherman was on that team, actually.”

4. He used to be Mike Stanton

Mike Stanton (PHOTO: Lawrence Jackson/AP Photo)

For the first five years of his professional career, Stanton went by his middle name, Mike, becoming the third in a succession of Major Leagers named Mike Stanton — including the journeyman lefty pictured above. But before the start of his third big-league season, Stanton made it clear that he preferred to be called Giancarlo.

“I changed to Mike for the wrong reasons,” he said. “When I was a kid, no one could pronounce my name right. So I just wanted to take the easy way out: ‘Call me Mike.’ I felt like I left it for the wrong reasons, so I went back to it.”

Asked if any more name changes were coming, Stanton said, “you never know, man. I could get bored.”

5. He’s always in trade rumors

Speculation has swirled around Stanton’s availability since he Tweeted he was “pissed” about the Marlins’ 2012 fire sale. But though fans of all 29 other teams clamor for their clubs to get Stanton, it makes no sense for the Marlins to deal him: He’s not set for free agency until after the 2016 season, and Miami doesn’t appear that far off from contention.

“Those types of rumors will be going on my whole career,” said Stanton. “That (Tweet) was specific to what was said was going to happen and what happened. I was upset with the course that we took, because it wasn’t the way we said we were going to go. Now we seem to be going in the right direction.”

The Marlins’ slugger ran a 4.5-second 40-yard dash as a high-school football standout.

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